Nov 4, 2009, 13:18 GMT
Cairo - US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on Wednesday again tried to calm Arab fears of a US reversal on its policy on Israeli construction in the West Bank.
'Our policy on settlement has not changed,' Clinton told reporters after meeting Egyptian President Hosny Mubarak in Cairo. 'We do not accept the legitimacy of settlement activity.
'Ending all settlement activity - current and future - would be preferable,' she said.
The top US diplomat met earlier with her Egyptian counterpart, Ahmed Abul Gheit, and intelligence chief Omar Suleiman, who is leading Egyptian efforts to broker a reconciliation deal between rival Palestinian factions Fatah and Hamas.
The message on settlements was Clinton's latest attempt to allay Arab concerns that US President Barack Obama's administration was retreating from its calls for a freeze on Israeli construction in the West Bank.
'Perhaps those of us who work for (US President Barack Obama) and communicate about this issue should have made it very clear that there was no change in our position, that we were absolutely committed to the end of settlement activity,' Clinton told al-Jazeera news channel on Tuesday.
In Morocco the day before, Clinton also said the US position against settlements had not changed. She also said that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's stance on settlements still 'falls far short of what we would characterize as our position.'
US Assistant Secretary of State PJ Crowley, speaking to reporters on Clinton's plane Tuesday night, elaborated on that message.
'What we're trying to do ... is to try to just figure out what is the best way forward. How can we help move the parties towards the start of negotiations,' he said.
Arab diplomats and politicians reacted with alarm to Clinton's statements to reporters after meeting with Netanyahu in Israel on Saturday. In those remarks, she appeared to back the Israeli position that continued Israeli construction in the West Bank should not preclude new peace talks.
She hailed as 'unprecedented' Netanyahu's offer to suspend construction in West Bank settlements save those in East Jerusalem, which Israel annexed in 1967, and for 3,000 housing units already in progress elsewhere.
In Cairo on Wednesday, Clinton described that offer as 'not what we would prefer, because we would like to see everything ended forever.'
After she made her remarks, Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said that if Israel did not stop all construction in West Bank settlements, then there was no chance of resuming peace negotiations.
'A settlement freeze is a settlement freeze,' he said. 'There are no half solutions.'
In a statement released by Netanyahu's office Wednesday, the Israeli prime minister suggested that what he called the 'hardening of the Palestinian Authority's positions' might be ascribed to Palestinian legislative elections Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas hopes to hold in January.
Mubarak and Jordan's King Abdullah, the leaders of two crucial US allies in the region and the two Arab countries that have signed peace deals with Israel, have backed the Palestinian position.
They warned of 'catastrophic consequences on the region's stability and security resulting from the failure to seize the current opportunity for making peace.'
They also emphasized the need for 'an immediate cessation of Israeli unilateral actions, particularly the building of settlements and jeopardizing the identity of Jerusalem and holy places.'
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